<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>chewing gum (and how to raise a child you kidnapped and brainwashed) by Anonymous</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25668148">chewing gum (and how to raise a child you kidnapped and brainwashed)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/'>Anonymous</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Umbrella Academy (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Canon Compliant, Gen, i love lila. i love the handler. this is the inevitable result of that, s2 spoilers!!!</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 04:07:57</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,684</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25668148</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>"I'm <i>fun,</i> aren't I? I'm a <i>fun</i> mother? A good mother? I feed you and keep you clean and hydrated and teach you things? So then why must you disobey me? Why must you put <i>gum</i> in my <i>hair?</i>”</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>The Handler (Umbrella Academy) &amp; Lila Pitts</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>9</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>90</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Anonymous</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>chewing gum (and how to raise a child you kidnapped and brainwashed)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>basic warnings for the handler being horrible, but nothin huge! really her horribleness is kind of played down</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Children, the Handler thought, were awful.</p><p>They just <i>were.</i> She could say that the sky was blue (in most variations of the timeline) and that the grass was green (again, usually) and those two things would be just as simple of facts. Children were, now and forever, always would be, would never stop being, <i>awful.</i></p><p>The Handler knew this for certain more than anything she had ever known in her life as she stared into the mirror at the piece of gum in her hair.</p><p>She thought that children were supposed to go through their rebellious phases at any time between thirteen and nineteen years old. Not when they were <i>eleven</i> and annoying to boot. Lila had gone from being a sweet, quiet, scared little girl with special talents to a sweet, quiet, <i>obnoxious</i> little girl with special talents. To her credit, she knew danger when she saw it, including in the look in the Handler's eyes as soon as she spit the gum at her. This had all come out of the Handler's insistence on keeping her on a strict diet, because ballooning up like a whale was not what was best for her training.</p><p>Here was the thing: the little girl she had 'rescued' from her situation had a sweet tooth, and a sly streak a hundred miles wide. She would casually pop down to 1942 to steal pies from a window sill, or to 2009 to take a whole box of Kit-Kats from the backroom of a corner shop. She would steal snacks from the breakroom, from the fridges even if the snacks were in tupperware and labeled with people's names, from people's pockets.</p><p>The Handler thought it was all rather entertaining, really, and encouraged it. It helped that she was the only one not stolen from, the only one not bothered by her daughter's mischief, up until Lila insisted that she have chocolate cake for <i>breakfast</i> instead of <i>dinner</i> and also for <i>brunch</i> and <i>lunch</i> and <i>second dinner,</i> which the Handler was certain she picked up from Lord of the Rings or something.</p><p>(Yes, she's seen the movies. Sue her. She's also seen every single silent film made between 1890 and 1930, and all the Human Centipede movies even though one of them – she forgets which one – almost made her throw up at one point, and not only does she not throw up, she doesn't like the sensation of almost throwing up.</p><p>Variety is good.</p><p>You never know when you're going to have to make an obscure <i>The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari</i> reference.)</p><p>The Handler usually bent to the will of the child, in these situations, because it was just <i>easier.</i> The way skipping lunch because breakfast was so much better was easier, the way having someone to do wardrobe fittings for her was easier, the way using one of the trainees' backs as a footstool when her feet were hurting was easier. What did she care if Lila got a dozen cavities? They had dental. What did she care if Lila grew up to be a spoiled brat? The spoiled brat would be working under <i>her.</i> What did she care about any of it at all?</p><p>Only Lila had demanded the cake in such an <i>irritatingly</i> bossy tone of voice, and the Handler's natural response to such things was usually to say <i>no</i> and, if it was anyone else but Lila, have them incinerated or tossed in the garbage chute to be ground up and fed to the birds outside, or something like that.</p><p>Instead, she'd just said no. No, Lila, you aren't getting your cake right now. No, Lila. No, Lila. No—</p><p>And that's when the gum hit.</p><p>Or, more accurately, was spat. <i>Spat.</i> Like a volley, right from the wicked girl's mouth, right into the Handler's hair.</p><p>And that's when the Handler reminded herself that hitting children was normally frowned upon, and she hadn't hit Lila yet, and she wasn't really interested in doing so. It was most certainly not in her own best interest, after all. Catching more flies with honey than blood, and whatnot. Or was it vinegar?</p><p>Whatever.</p><p>The point being, the Handler took a deep breath, looked down at Lila's horrified little face, and turned around, and walked off down the hallway, around the corner, and into the nearest bathroom. She pounded on the doors of stalls and told everyone to finish their business and get out <i>right now,</i> and being wise enough to recognize her voice and more importantly the <i>tone</i> of it, they all scurried out in a mostly orderly line.</p><p>She was going to have to cut it, she realized.</p><p>"I'm going to have to cut it,” she said.</p><p>This did not make the Handler very happy at all. She was a strong believer in her own personal philosophy, which was that change was inevitable and always coming, but <i>not</i> when it came to her hair. Her hair was off limits. She would cut it when she wanted to cut it, when the time came, when it was the right time.</p><p>That time was not now.</p><p>She liked her hair. She didn't want to have to take a goddamned <i>knife</i> to it.</p><p>“Mum?”</p><p>The Handler breathed in deeply at the little voice that came from behind her. She wasn't going to lash out. She wasn't. She turned around, hands settled back, palms first, on the edge of the sink. Lila looked tiny, afraid and ashamed, her head ducked, staring at their feet instead of making eye contact.</p><p>“Do you have anything you'd like to say to me, little one?”</p><p>“Sorry,” Lila said immediately, her voice quivering. “Didn't mean to.”</p><p>“Well,” the Handler sighed, “of <i>course</i> you meant to. That's what spite is. Normally I'd be proud, you know. Mmhm. I'm <i>fun,</i> aren't I? I'm a <i>fun</i> mother? A good mother? I feed you and keep you clean and hydrated and teach you things?” She waited for Lila's hasty nod before going on. “So then why must you disobey me? Why must you put <i>gum</i> in my <i>hair?</i>”</p><p>“I—I didn't—“</p><p>The Handler leaned forward, off and away from the sink. “Yes, yes, so you said. Why did you, then, if you didn't <i>mean to?</i>”</p><p>Lila opened and closed her mouth a few times. </p><p>The Handler hated that. She hated it from Lila, or from anyone else who ever dared to come to her unprepared with not even a <i>bad</i> excuse on hand. Sometimes, no excuse at all worked better than a bad excuse. Other times, all she wanted to hear was <i>something,</i> some justification, no matter how poor and dimwitted it might have been. She settled back against the sink again with a sigh, to express her disappointment. She only felt a <i>little</i> satisfied by the way Lila wilted before her. </p><p>The Handler turned to face the mirror again, poking at the extraordinarily large wad of gum in her blonde-white curls. It always took her such a long time to grow out her real hair the <i>natural</i> way, no timeplay involved. It also took her such a long time to find wigs that suited her just right.</p><p>“Well,” she said, “I suppose we'll have to work with it. Fetch me some scissors, and no dilly-dallying.”</p><p>She watched Lila through the mirror as she hesitated just for a moment, then turned around and hurried out of the bathroom, head lowered.</p><p>It was almost pitiful enough to feel sorry for her, but the Handler rarely ever felt sorry for anyone or anything, and she wasn't about to start now.</p><p>It turned out that, really, things could have been worse. She didn't <i>hate</i> the short hair, though she knew it would take a while longer to warm up to it completely. By the time she was done giving Lila precise instructions on how to cut the back, they had spent a joined total of forty-eight minutes in the bathroom.</p><p>“It's pretty,” Lila mumbled, still not looking at her.</p><p>Really, the Handler could have punished her a little longer, a little harder. There were so many options before her, none which ever involved laying a hand on the child or locking her in an enclosed space like she'd seen and heard so many people do throughout history, both fictional and otherwise. She could take away her food for a few days. She could leave her in the wilds of Siberia for a night. She could take her to a zoo and kill one of the big cats in front of her.</p><p>The big cats were always Lila's favorite.</p><p>The Handler found herself not wanting to do any of that. Her anger had cooled, her disappointment had warmed. There was a lot to be said about leaving a child to stew in the feeling of having angered a grown-up once in a while. She knew just from looking at her that Lila would be infinitely better off for it, wiser and hopefully less quick to spit gum at people.</p><p>Well.</p><p>“You can always put gum in other people's hair, you know,” the Handler said, drawing her fingers through Lila's long, dark curls. She made a mental note to cut it, maybe in a week once her daughter's child-brain had forgotten all about this incident. It would serve as a reminder, a punishment, <i>and</i> it would stop getting caught in the traps the Handler laid out for her during her training. “Just not mine.”</p><p>Lila's eyes flicked up to hers, and held there. She smiled a little. “Okay,” she said.</p><p>“Wonderful.” The Handler took one last look at herself in the mirror. Yes, the short cut wasn't all that bad after all. Maybe she'd keep it. For a while. “Now, let's get you that chocolate cake you wanted, shall we?”</p><p>Lila brightened in an instant, her whole face lighting up like it was her birthday come early. “Really?”</p><p>“Really,” the Handler said, guiding her from the bathroom, “and afterwards, your crossbow lessons start.”</p><p>“Why do I need to do that?”</p><p>“You're sounding awfully whiny, dear. And you never know when you'll need to shoot a crossbow.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>lila is an angel, the handler is not, but i would literally die for the both of them in a heartbeat.<br/>also i cant believe hot evil milf kate walsh is dead AGAIN. get outta here</p></blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>